LEXINGTON, Ky. - The Barretts select juvenile sale on March 14 was missing one of its big supporters this year, but the auction's upper market seemed to hold up well nonetheless. That's partly because the sale offered variety and attracted buyers from market levels below the $1 million mark.

This Tuesday is the 30th anniversary of the first Ocala Breeders' Sales Co. 2-year-olds in training sale at its Ocala venue. This year, 268 2-year-olds are cataloged to sell; the sale concludes on Wednesday. Thirty years ago, the inaugural Ocala sale recorded 187 2-year-olds sold for gross receipts of just over $2.5 million and an average price of $13,376.

Prime Timber, New York's leading freshman sire in 2005, has four New York-breds cataloged in the Ocala Breeders' Sales Co. selected 2-year-olds in training sale on March 21-22.

With his stakes-winning juvenile filly Cinderella's Dream leading the way, his progeny earned $422,519 last year.

Cinderella's Dream, a candidate for state champion in her division, won the Maid of the Mist and placed in the Grade 2 Demoiselle Stakes.

Prime Timber's New York-bred group consists of three colts and a filly.

The Maryland Horse Breeders Association has announced that Tom and Chris Bowman, Cherokee Wonder, and Louis Quatorze have been selected by the board of directors as the 2005 breeder, broodmare, and stallion of the year, respectively. The awards will be presented at the MHBA's annual awards dinner on April 21 at St. Patrick's Hall in Havre de Grace, Md. The 2005 Maryland-bred champions and Federico Tesio Award winners will also be honored that evening.

Fantastic Find, a Grade 1 winner and the dam of dual Grade 1 winner Finder's Fee, has died at age 20. The death was confirmed by Claiborne Farm in Paris, Ky.

The mare ruptured a uterine artery and died March 8 at Claiborne after foaling a healthy Dixie Union filly, according to manager Gus Koch. The filly has been placed on a nurse mare.

The Kentucky Senate has passed a measure calling for increased disclosure by agents in horse sales. The owner of Stonestreet Stables, Jess Jackson, had lobbied personally for the passage of the bill, which passed the Senate in a 36-0 vote Wednesday.

The House passed a different version of the bill in late February. The Senate-approved legislation now returns to the full House for a concurrence vote. If the House concurs with the Senate version, the measure will head to Gov. Ernie Fletcher for signing into law.

POMONA, Calif. - Lance Robinson was not satisfied with the bidding on a Distorted Humor yearling colt that he was selling last September at Keeneland, so he and his partners in Gulf Coast Farm opted to buy the colt back. That decision now looks like a million bucks.

On Tuesday night at the Barretts sale of select 2-year-olds in training, the colt - currently saddled with the name Cowtown Cat - was purchased by WinStar Farm for $1.5 million, more than 10 times the $135,000 high bid he attracted just six months ago.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Jess Jackson has added three more defendants to a lawsuit he filed in Southern California alleging that his early bloodstock advisers defrauded him in a number of transactions for horses and land in Kentucky.

Jackson's motion for an amended complaint, filed in San Diego on March 9 and first reported by The Blood-Horse, adds bloodstock agents Frederic Sauque and Fernando Diaz-Valdez and the Buckram Oak Holdings company to the list of defendants.

A colt by Richter Scale who was purchased for $825,000 was the highest-priced horse sold during the first hour on Tuesday at the Barretts March sale of 2-year-olds in training in Pomona, Calif.

John Sadler, a Southern California-based trainer, said he purchased the colt for "undisclosed clients," but it was believed that Sadler was acting on behalf of a partnership that included the Searing family's CRK Stables.

LAS VEGAS - The Kentucky Derby picture really heats up this weekend with four major stakes from coast to coast: the Gotham (at Aqueduct), Rebel (Oaklawn), San Felipe (Santa Anita), and Tampa Bay Derby (Tampa Bay Downs).

Gotham

Achilles of Troy, Keyed Entry, and Sweetnorthernsaint are the headliners, but watch out for Hesanoldsalt, who may be the beneficiary of what should be a hot pace.